Once again, I'm reading "Veeck as in Wreck," and the way he describes the 1959 White Sox almost makes me want to cry tears of joy. The White Sox had the City of Chicago in it's palm, and it further reaffirms my bold transition from Chubs fan (NW 'burbs) to White Sox MAN! My friends give me so much $#!t for this transition, but I stick to my guns and tell them the WHITE SOX are Chicago's TRUE blue-collar sporting team. The Chubs are for the tourists.

It's a shame that my generation (I'm 25) isn't familiar with the great glorious history of the Chicago White Sox. They just don't understand, and we need a superb MKTG department to remind everybody of just exactly WHO WE ARE.

The Bulls have assembled one of the most amazing marketing staffs known to man, and it shows with the Bulls ranking 3rd in NBA attendance. I like our marekting people, and I feel they're doing a good job, but I feel like Chicago doesn't quite understand what the Sox are all about.

BackInBlack

03-17-2004, 07:41 PM

Getting back to my question, what I really wanted to know, is, if any of you experience the 1959 GO GO SOX and what that experience was like?

We need to tie together the generations and make Chicago understand what CHICAGO BASEBALL IS REALLY ABOUT.

I also found it interesting that when Veeck bought the White Sox from Dorothy and Charles Comiskey, that Comiskey Field already had a reputation for being dangerous and downtrodden. He lit up the surrounding parts of the park as much light as you'd see INSIDE the ballpark, and mentioned how the surrounding neighborhood experienced a real renovation (similar to what we saw happen with Lincoln Park). Suddenly, the Sox became the popular ticket in town. Veeck said when teams go the World Series, most teams decorate the stadiums with all these nice ribbons and flowers, but when the Sox went in 1969, you had the entire 'Bridge lined up with all these beautiful assembles of gardendry and the community really rallied around their beloved CHICAGO WHITE SOX.

I also love how Mayor Daley has stuck to his guns (when the Cubs have recently been the popular ticket in town) and remained true to his WHITE SOX ROOTS.

Do you guys agree that Mayor Daley has been a fantastic asset for the City of Chicago? My father told me when I was young that "Our Mayor Daley" worked wonders in beatifying our world-class city and keeping it "so fresh and so clean." It makes for a wonderful city for the tourists to visit and it reflects well on a national perspective. I've been working in NYC for the last year and my sales territory takes place down in the Financial District, down on Wall Street in Lower Manhattan. Usually people ask me where I'm from due to the accent, and I tell them Chicago. They all love Chicago. They laugh at Boston, but they all say Chicago is a version of NYC in the Midwest. While I'm not about to take a back seat to anybody, I'd have to agree that both cities are FUNDAMENTALLY the same. HUGE ASS skyline with the energy and electricity of a big-time corporate city with all the fun that comes with it (night clubs and extracurricular activities). The only thing Chicago's lacking is a little salt water action. You guys agree? Can't go wrong with Lake Geneva. Back in the day, if you were a wealthy Chicagoan, you had a summer resort up in Geneva. Reminds me of the Great Outdoors with John Candy. Anyone know where that took place?

Lip Man 1

03-17-2004, 08:25 PM

I was four at the time. Don't remember a thing except what I've researched over the years.

By the way read Bob Vanderberg's book, "59' Summer of The Sox, The Year The World Series Came To Chicago." Fabulous read.

Also Bill Veeck had very little to do with that team winning a title which is why he did what he did in the winter of 59 - 60.

Still, tell me if you disagree, but it seems as though Bill Veeck indentified with the White Sox more than any other ballclub that he ever owned. Yes, he loved being the big fish in the small pond known as Cleveland (the world must've been a different place back then), and he said he never expected his fan base to be more exciting than those days with the Mistake on the Lake. When he went to the White Sox, the "good guys in black" blew his mind and he experienced baseball management at its absolute best and most rewarding.

I understand Veeck had little to do with the great fortunes that beset the Go Go Sox of '59, but HE WAS THERE to play it up as big as anybody else ever could. This is when he invented the EXPLODING SCOREBOARD, which was soon copied by almost 1/3 of all MLB teams. This is the time when he handed out Roses to the first 4,000 (or so) females who entered the ballpark. This is the same time when he denied all his friends "World Series Access" to accomodate the White Sox faithful. Bill Veeck IS the White Sox.

duke of dorwood

03-17-2004, 09:33 PM

I remember the clinching game, the sirens going off on the firehouse at 69 th & Justine, the adding of Big Klu before the trading deadline, and a great defensive team.

duke of dorwood

03-17-2004, 09:35 PM

And Bill Veeck visited our church and I have a picture somewhere standing next to him while he signed autographs at St Theodore church

npdempse

03-17-2004, 10:40 PM

Originally posted by BackInBlack
Still, tell me if you disagree, but it seems as though Bill Veeck indentified with the White Sox more than any other ballclub that he ever owned. Yes, he loved being the big fish in the small pond known as Cleveland (the world must've been a different place back then), and he said he never expected his fan base to be more exciting than those days with the Mistake on the Lake. When he went to the White Sox, the "good guys in black" blew his mind and he experienced baseball management at its absolute best and most rewarding.

Mmm, I don't know about that. He made MAJOR inroads in Cleveland, including being brave enough to introduce Doby and setting the all-time attendance record with a team that had been doing squat until then.

And I have the feeling that deep down he may always have been a Cubs man at heart--he grew up in Wrigley, even planted a lot of that stupid ivy.

Realist

03-17-2004, 10:46 PM

Thank Christ. Finally a thread I'm too young for. :cool:

DrCrawdad

03-17-2004, 11:23 PM

The '59 Sox were 5 years BDrC. My sole story about the '59 Series is that an uncle of mine snuck into a World Series game at the grand old Comiskey Park. I've always admired him for that feat.

ode to veeck

03-17-2004, 11:41 PM

In '59 I was still a little kid wearing a Braves hat with an M on it in Milwaukee. The summer I was born, my mom (a baseball nut) turned down Braves WS tix to take care of the new kid at home. When I heard the story 25 years later (after my 1st 20 years of Sox "gloom and despair") I asked her, "what, were you NUTS!?!"

I didn't become a fan of the Go-Go Sox til we moved to Chicago in '62 and I got indoctrinated to Yankee hating by my grandfather, my dad, & their friends (south siders all). The following year was when I started drinking beer regularly at the ballgames, stealing gulps from all of them the whole game long at the age of seven.

Medford Bobby

03-18-2004, 12:45 AM

My Dad was at Game 6 with his Mom.... My Dad says the entire 50's Go-Go Sox was always a blast to follow. I always wondered what the World Series would have been like if the Dodgers had lost to the Braves in that one game play off. I think the Sox would have beaten the Bravos at County Stadium instead of playing the crummy Coliseum in LA. Just thank God and Webcor my Dad recorded the Sox clinching the Pennant for all of us future Sox fans to enjoy..............until this YEAR?????

:gulp: Here's to Big KLU's two home runs in Game 1 of the World Series.............

owensmouth

03-18-2004, 06:03 AM

Wanta irritate a Dodger fan?

Remind them that the White Sox are the only team with a winning record against Sandy Kofax. He was the losing pitcher in game 5.

Realist

03-18-2004, 06:20 AM

Originally posted by ode to veeck
In '59 I was still a little kid wearing a Braves hat with an M on it in Milwaukee. The summer I was born, my mom (a baseball nut) turned down Braves WS tix to take care of the new kid at home. When I heard the story 25 years later (after my 1st 20 years of Sox "gloom and despair") I asked her, "what, were you NUTS!?!"

I didn't become a fan of the Go-Go Sox til we moved to Chicago in '62 and I got indoctrinated to Yankee hating by my grandfather, my dad, & their friends (south siders all). The following year was when I started drinking beer regularly at the ballgames, stealing gulps from all of them the whole game long at the age of seven.

Great story. Thank you very much. There's a movie there.

Realist

03-18-2004, 06:22 AM

Originally posted by Medford Bobby

:gulp: Here's to Big KLU's two home runs in Game 1 of the World Series.............

I'll drink to that. :gulp:

Maximo

03-18-2004, 08:30 AM

I was 8 years old at the time and my folks owned a bar/restaurant in Mishawaka, Indiana. My most vivid memories of that era concerned the customers who frequented that establishment and how excited they were about the White Sox.
I remember that talking about the Sox was all anyone did, especially in the late summer during the pennant race.

Mishawaka was more of a "blue collar" town in those days with a large population of folks who were of Italian and Belgian ancestry.
(some remnants of that ancestry remain today). I really think hard working European/Americans identified with the Sox back then. When "Big Klu" came over in the trade, all of the Polish folks on the west side of South Bend felt a further attachment.

What was really amazing around here was back in those days, dime stores and department stores were "loaded" with White Sox paraphenalia. Most school kids wore Sox caps and, if you were lucky, Sox jackets. "Cubs" items were not to be found anywhere...........period!!!

As I mentioned in another post a while back, most of us kids didn't even know the Cubs existed at that time....let alone pulled for them. The Sox owned the South Bend/ Mishawaka area back in those days and could have done things to still own it even up to this day. Obviously, things are different today. That's why I always thought when Class A minor league baseball came to South Bend as a Sox affiliate, recapturing Sox fans in this area was a natural. Alas......present ownership pulled the team out of here several years ago under the guise of "cost savings".

Another reason why I will never again like or trust Jerry Reinsdorf.

Procol Harum

03-18-2004, 09:20 AM

I was 5 at the time and was "lucky" enough to become a cognisant baseball-watching young White Sox fan the next spring. My only "memory" of the '59 championship is the pre-season exhibition game against the Cubs played at Wrigley where I remember Jack Brickhouse interviewing Al Lopez and talking about the previous year's pennant and trip to the World Series.

And I ain't been any closer to a World Series since then....

Paulwny

03-18-2004, 10:31 AM

I was a young teenager at the time. I don't live in the Chi area so I can't relate any activies, etc.
The most vivid memory was listening to the clinching game and Aparicio turning the dp. I had to listen to the tribe broadcast, couldn't pick up WCFL in Chi. I walked out of my bedroom with my arms raised. My father, a Cards fan, shook his head in disbelief, he knew what occurred. He walked into the kitchen, returned with a bottle of beer and handed it to me. I can still see the shocked look on my mother's face. Today my father would be in jail for aiding in the delinquency of a minor.
Even though the sox lost the WS I wasn't overly disappointed. I had seen the promised land and thought "This is only the beginning, many more to come" (ha, good thinking Paul).
I spent the off-season hammering all the yankmee fans I knew.
It was an unbelieveable experience.
I could go on but, my eyes are getting misty.

soxrme

03-18-2004, 11:56 AM

Comiskey Park used to rock. The fans would yell in unison GO-GO
when Aparicio or Rivera got on base. You knew they were going and so did the other team, and they still took the base. The crowds especially for the Yankees were so loud ( I was in 7th grade at the time so maybe it sounded loud to me). We had a great mix of veterans, good rookies and picked up Big Klu later in the season.
The night we clinched was great, Brickhouse was so excited on the call, it was magical.
Veeck was so colorful and such a marketing genius. One thing I remember the most was it rained horribly one night and very few fans showed up so he gave a car away.

misty60481

03-18-2004, 12:49 PM

I was a SOX fan all my life thru the miserable 40s and more promising 50s then when they finally win I was in Parris Island, S.C. but got to watch game 3 on my 22nd birthday SOX got 12 hits and lost 3-1 sound familiar???